The series tells a side-story of Deus Ex: Human Revolution, retaining the protagonist Adam Jensen, and taking place right after the fight with the notorious antagonist Lawrence Barrett. The comics expand on many aspects of the storyline, primarily Jensen's past as a SWAT team member and its connections to his present life. It makes for an interesting segue in the Human Revolution story, featuring many familiar faces such as David Sarif, Francis Pritchard, Dr. Marcovic, and Faridah Malik, along with a few new in-depth individuals.
Tropes:
- Action Girl: Katrina, who teams up with Adam to take down Durant.
- Almost Kiss: Similar to an example from the main game, Adam has a moment with Katrina that's ruined when Pritchard calls to tell him that he's needed immediately.
- Artificial Limbs: It is revealed that half of Adam's legs were removed during the augmentation surgery after the attack, as well as both of his arms.
- Ax-Crazy: Durant.
- Back-to-Back Badasses: Adam and Katrina, while fighting off Durant's goons in her apartment.
- Badass Normal: The non-augmented Adam managed to beat his senior officer (and augment) Durant by surprising him with an EMP grenade and getting a lucky shot off on him.
- Big Damn Heroes: Malik shows up to lay down suppressing fire on Durant when he attempts to kill Adam at Katrina's apartment.
- Brought Down to Normal: Adam does this during the confrontation with Durant in the church in order to disable his augmentations and break his concentration. Durant does the same thing two years later at the car plant when he also uses an EMP to disable Adam's augs.
- Calling the Old Man Out: The younger Adam calls out Durant (his mentor) for betraying his uniform and leading a corrupt police team.
- Continuity Snarl:
- Adam uses a surprising number of his augmentations, even though the story takes place comparatively early in the game's plotline and the player wouldn't physically have enough experience/Praxis kits to unlock that many abilities.
- Additionally, Adam had a relationship with Katrina (whom he saw sacrifice herself to save his life), yet she's never mentioned in the rest of the game, even though the Hengsha mission in the game takes place right after this and Adam is more interested in how big the city is.
- Corrupt Cop: Durant, the rest of his squad and Dredger.
- Cybernetics Eat Your Soul: Discussed extensively.
- It is revealed that one of the primary reasons for the opposition to augmentation is due to the dangerous psychological disorders some augmented people develop (though this is more due to the nasty side effects of the anti-rejection drugs they have to take than the augs themselves).
- Durant himself has a strong aversion to augmentations, but ends up becoming psychopathic after receiving his first upgrades, which eventually leads Adam to have to put him down himself.
- Doomed by Canon: Considering that Katrina never appears anywhere in the game proper, it's a Foregone Conclusion that she'll be killed by the end of the comic.
- Dying as Yourself: Discussed. Durant tells the younger Adam that he should have let him die instead of forcing him to get augmentations. As a result, he becomes more and more unhinged and violent as time passes.
- Expy: Katrina Sutherland is one for Lara Croft of all people.
- Gets a Shout-Out when Pritchard calls her that.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Played With. Adam intends to sacrifice himself in a last-ditch effort to save Katrina from Durant, but Katrina ends up sacrificing herself to save him instead.
- How We Got Here: The series mainly exists to explain why Dr. Markovic is not present at the LIMB clinic when Adam returns to Detroit midway through the main game.
- Interquel: Canonically, the comic series takes place between the fourth and fifth missions in Human Revolution, cutting in right after Adam and Malik leave Highland Park in the main game and ending just before Adam heads to Hengsha.
- Ironic Echo: Adam uses an EMP grenade to surprise Durant and knock out his augmentations in the fight after the Mexicantown Massacre. Two years later, Durant does the same thing against Adam when the latter goes to rescue Markovic at the car plant.
- It's Personal: Adam holds this attitude towards finding and killing Namir.
- Kick the Dog: Durant immediately proves himself to be a scumbag by fueling the Detroit riots by wading into a group of protestors and triggering his Typhoon aug, killing several of them.
- Killed Mid-Sentence: Dredger, who has his killswitch activated when he begins to explain the "Power Behind The Power" to Adam and Katrina.
- Lady of War: Katrina, who has the title to go along with it.
- Manly Tears: Adam cries after Katrina sacrifices herself to save him.
- Mythology Gag: Durant's method of fueling the riots (detonating the Typhoon in the middle of a crowd) is similar to Yelena Federova's similar response in one of the trailers (which is never used in the game proper), where she fires on civilians to accelerate the rioting.
- Naked First Impression: Adam first meets Katrina when he busts in on her while she's having a shower. She's not amused.
- Off with His Head!: Arkady Vronsky is beheaded by Durant while speeding down the interstate on a motorbike.
- Rasputinian Death: In the course of a single day, Durant survives a direct explosion next to him, being on a crashing VTOL (and landing safely), being wounded during a shootout by Jensen, having another explosion go off in his face, and still surviving long enough to talk to Adam before being finished off with a bullet to the head.
- Recurring Boss: Durant, who survives several attacks that would have killed a non-augmented person, and keeps coming back for more. It takes him getting repeatedly beaten, blown up by an explosion in close proximity and Adam personally administering a headshot (all within a few minutes) to make sure he's dead for real.
- Sadistic Choice: Durant tries to force Adam into one by outfitting him and Katrina with explosives, where only one will be saved. Katrina decides to Take a Third Option by sacrificing herself to give Adam a shot at killing Durant once and for all.
- Shower Scene: Adam and Katrina get busy in a shower.
- Spotting the Thread: Adam almost immediately figures out that Durant is behind the Humanity First bombing when he sees the latter's trademark red crosshair logo (painted with blood on a camera).
- Title Drop: Done twice by Durant, who at one point says, "The human revolution begins here," and later chants the phrase "deus ex".
